


Body Language

by willow_larkspur



Series: Gwen's Competition Fics [29]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Autistic Harry Potter, Black Hermione Granger, Book 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Desi Harry Potter, Gen, Potions Accident, Sign Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-12
Updated: 2019-04-29
Packaged: 2020-01-13 13:27:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18469897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/willow_larkspur/pseuds/willow_larkspur
Summary: Harry Potter is deaged, but Hermione is there to make things better.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Magi Silverwolf (Magi_Silverwolf)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magi_Silverwolf/gifts).



> Legal Disclaimer: I own my stuff, but not the original source material. That belongs to whoever. Also, the opinions and interpretations I use here may not reflect the same in said whoever that owns the source material. Look, I’m just a poor college librarian. Suing me isn’t going to get you anything but tears.  
> Warning: This work may be offensive to some readers. Feel free to back out if that’s you.  
> Author’s Note: This is for the Hogwarts April Auction. I’ve never done a deaging fic before and probably won’t again.

(^^)  
**Body Language**  
(^^)

Harry wasn’t certain what was happening. Around him were people dressed in black robes, like old-fashioned university students. They were all staring at him. Nervously, he reached up to flatten his fringe, because Aunt Petunia always hated when people could see it. Black fabric fell off his hand as he raised it. For the first time, he realized that he was wearing his own black robe, and it hung off him just like Dudley’s old clothes always did.

“Harry?” questioned a girl nearby. She was rather pretty, even if her front teeth stuck out a bit, with very curly hair and skin that was even darker than his own. Her hazel eyes caught his and he quickly dropped his gaze to the stones beneath his feet. Aunt Petunia didn’t like how he looked at people, either too long or not long enough. It was better to simply look down. “Oh, god, that is you.”

“Blimey, Hermione, you mean that you shrank Harry Potter?”

Harry peeked through his fringe at the speaker, a gangly boy with red-orange hair that would have made Aunt Petunia absolutely livid with its shaggy length. His wide eyes were a sharp blue that spoke of intelligence. Freckles covered his nose like sugar over pudding. The girl—Hermione—put her hands on her hips with a huff, making the boy shrink back like she had moved to smack him.

“I didn’t do anything!” She looked over at Harry again. “Besides, he doesn’t seem _smaller_ , exactly. He seems, well, _younger_.”

“Excellent deduction, Miss Granger,” congratulated an older man. He was very fat, though not in the same sloppy way that Dudley and Uncle Vernon was, and had a thick mustache like a walrus’. “Mr. Potter seems to have been deaged, even if such a thing should have been impossible with any of the ingredients being used in today’s potion.”

“Can you reverse it, Professor Slughorn?”

Harry backed away as the man came closer, bumping into a table. The sudden bump made a bunch of scales fall off the table and scatter across the stone floor. Harry froze at the sight of the mess, uncertain how the people were going to react. Aunt Petunia never liked it when Harry made messes. The girl from before dropped to her knees, keeping her hands out to her sides. She smiled at him, and it was a nice smile, not a mean one.

“Hey, it’s okay,” she said softly. “It’s probably scary, suddenly being in a new place, huh? But we’re not going to hurt you, Harry.”

 

Harry picked a loose string on the robes he was wearing as he looked over the girl. Dudley and his friends had used that trick a few times. He didn’t think Hermione was trying to trick him, though. Despite how the red-haired boy had shied away from her when she had been upset, Harry got the feeling that she was very nice. Mrs. Figg had a cat like that, all gruff-looking but as sweet as can be.

Carefully, he signed a question at her. He didn’t trust his voice to work properly, not when he was this scared and surrounded by so many new things. Aunt Petunia didn’t like when Harry signed or when he asked questions, but maybe Hermione would be different. Maybe she was like the teacher who had taught him how to sign in the first place.

“Why is he waving his hands like that?” the red-haired boy asked. Hermione’s eyes went wide with recognition, and she lifted her hands to answer him. “Wait, what are you doing, Hermione?”

“It’s sign language,” Hermione said out loud while her hands told Harry about magic. “I didn’t even know that Harry knew it. It’s primarily used by people who can’t hear or speak.”

“But Harry is perfectly capable of talking normally,” the boy argued. Harry didn’t particularly like the way he was talking to Hermione, who was being so nice. “So why is he flapping his hands about like a mad elf?”

“Don’t be rude, Ron,” Hermione ordered, her hands stilling as she twisted around to level a glare at the boy. “It’s a perfectly legitimate way to communicate, even for people capable of speech! Honestly, is your imagination the size of a teaspoon, too?” The boy—Ron—went to say something but Hermione cut him off with a sharp and rude gesture before turning back to Harry. When she started signing this time, her spoken words matched her hands. “How old are you, Harry?”

Harry had to think about it. He had never had a birthday that he remembered. Dudley had, though, and he knew he was supposed to be about Dudley’s age. So carefully, Harry lifted his left hand and spread his fingers wide. Hermione’s eyes grew wide and started to glisten like she was about to cry. Harry quickly pulled his hands back against his chest, hiding them in the huge sleeves of his robe.

“You’re so small,” Hermione said, before turning to look at Ron. “Harry was always smaller than us, but I didn’t realize that it went this far back.” She turned back to him, holding out her arms like she was reaching for him. She still looked like she was about to cry. “Can I hug you, Harry?”

Harry hesitated. It could be a trick. But a hug sounded so nice. Dudley got them all the time. Aunt Petunia didn’t like when Harry asked for a hug, but he wasn’t asking this time. Hermione was. Maybe a hug would make up for whatever he had done that was making her look so sad.

He shuffled forward, struggling not to trip over the fabric around his legs. Once he was close enough to, he leaned into her. Her arms instantly wrapped around him, feeling just as nice as it had always looked when Dudley got a hug. He relaxed against her, briefly wondering if he should wrap his arms around her but deciding not to risk upsetting her. Hermione squeezed him tighter, as if she had heard his thoughts.

It was still nice.


	2. Bad Translations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes things are not interpreted the way that we imagined they would be, especially if one is a very small child in a very scary place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Legal Disclaimer: I own my stuff, but not the original source material. That belongs to whoever. Also, the opinions and interpretations I use here may not reflect the same in said whoever that owns the source material. Look, I’m just a poor college librarian. Suing me isn’t going to get you anything but tears.  
> Warning: This work may be offensive to some readers. Feel free to back out if that’s you.  
> Author’s Note: Sometimes intimidation looks differently when you are very small.

(^^)  
**Bad Translations**  
(^^)

Harry didn’t understand what he had done to make Madam Pomfrey so mad. He didn’t fully understand how he had gotten into the place that he was either. One minute he had been dusting the shelves at Number Four and the next he was in that dim classroom wearing the robe and surrounded by other people also wearing robes. That was scary enough that his voice ran away, but luckily the pretty girl with the curly hair could also talk with her hands. Hermione was really, really nice, even if Ron was clearly a little scared of her.

The professor with the walrus mustache had told Hermione and Ron to take him to the hospital wing to see what could be done about whatever had happened to make Harry be there, or maybe it was to make Harry be so much younger than Hermione and Ron. (Harry didn’t understand a lot of what Hermione and the professor had discussed; it had all sounded too much like a secret code at the time.) Harry hadn’t argued, not even a little bit. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe he should have mentioned that medicine shouldn’t be wasted on him, just like Aunt Petunia always reminded him when he tried to claim to not feel well. Or maybe they were all angry about having to waste their time on him, when freaks weren’t allowed to be any kind of sick.

Or maybe his mistake was in refusing to speak to the matron when she had asked her questions. He knew that he should have. Aunt Petunia always wanted prompt _verbal_ answers when she asked questions. Harry should have known better than to think the matron would be any more accepting of his signing than Aunt Petunia was. It wasn’t _normal_ to sign when he could hear well.

Hermione hadn’t yelled at Madam Pomfrey like she had Ron, which made sense. The matron was a lot like Aunt Petunia and apparently had _magic_ , which would probably hurt even worse than the frying pan. He hadn’t known Hermione very long, but the last thing he wanted was her to be hurt, especially because of _him_. She was just so _nice_ , and she was even willing to hug him! She made sure to translate as much as the matron allowed, but eventually the matron made both Hermione and Ron leave, because they were both healthy.

Which left Harry alone with her and in his current position of sitting on a bed trying to figure out why the matron was glaring at him. He didn’t understand what he had messed up this time. He had too many possibilities, and he simply didn’t _know_ which one was right, so he couldn’t even apologize to try to offset any potential punishment. And those punishments might include _magic_ , which had to be real, even if Uncle Vernon had always said it was _poppycock_ , because there was no other way that the paintings they had passed on their way to the hospital wing could have moved like they did. Harry was really sure that magic punishments were going to hurt worst of all.

Madam Pomfrey probably knew how to make it really hurt, too, because matrons always knew all kinds of medicine stuff. Dudley and his friends were always talking about how nurses always stabbed them when they visited the doctor’s office. It might have been them trying to scare him, but it could also be true. Besides, Madam Pomfrey had _magic_ , and Harry still wasn’t sure what that even _meant_ when combined with all the medicine stuff that she probably knew.

“What am I going to do with you, Mr. Potter?” she asked with her hand on her hips.

Harry gulped. Aunt Petunia did this sometimes, too, and Harry could never guess the correct answer. With Aunt Petunia, that question always meant bad things. It meant that none of the usual punishments were going to be good enough and something really big was needed. Even as lonely as his cupboard was and as much as it hurt for a few days after being allowed out, Harry always preferred it to having his punishment handed over to Uncle Vernon. That always hurt for _days_ and made it really hard to do his chores.

He lifted his hands only to drop them immediately when Madam Pomfrey made a tutting noise. He opened his mouth to try answering but couldn’t get more than a squeaky noise passed the back of his throat. His eyes prickled like he was going to make everything worse by sniveling.

Harry already missed Hermione.

“Well, I need to do some research to figure out how you managed to do this to yourself,” Madam Pomfrey announced in the silence that followed. “Do you think you can manage to stay out of trouble for a bit?” She eyed him suspiciously when he showed his enthusiasm for that plan by nodding his head more than he probably needed to. He stilled immediately. There was no need to test the matron’s patience anymore than he already had, even if he still didn’t know what he had done. “There’s some leisure books on the shelf over by my office. I don’t know how much you’ll be able to understand, but they should keep you occupied enough to stay out of trouble.”

Harry looked over at the shelf, shocked. Aunt Petunia would never have allowed him to just read, especially on his own. That was another bit of how he was not capable of being normal like he was supposed to be. Dudley didn’t like reading or even being read to, because stories were for babies and at five, Dudley wasn’t a baby anymore. He also struggled with even the really simple words if he was forced to try on his own. Harry loved reading though, even if he wasn’t allowed to do more than dust the books that Aunt Petunia got for Dudley. It had always come easy to him, which was really good when trying to figure out how to do things without bothering Aunt Petunia. She still wouldn’t have allowed Harry access to an entire shelf full of books to read just for fun.

“Well,” Madam Pomfrey snapped, making Harry flinch, “are you waiting for an engraved invitation? Go pick out a book.”

Harry hurried to get off the bed. He wasted no time walking across the space, not daring to run. Madam Pomfrey seemed like she wouldn’t like the implication that he was scared of her, no matter how intimidating she was. He picked out a book at random, drawn in because of the faded purple of its spine.

When he turned around to head back to the bed, he caught sight of the matron’s face. She was watching him with the same expression that Mrs. Figg used when talking to her cats. The instant that Madam Pomfrey noticed that he was looking at her, her face lost that softness, falling back into something that wasn’t quite a frown.

“Let me know if you need anything,” she ordered. “I’m going to keep my door open. _No mischief or toilet seats._ Do you understand?”

He nodded, not understanding why toilet seats deserved special mention but unable to even ask with the book in his hands and his voice still not wanting to obey. He settled himself on the same bed that Madam Pomfrey had made him sit earlier. At the time she had grumbled about name plaques; now she just ruffled his hair as they passed each other.

Harry sighed as he was left alone for the first time since appearing in the classroom earlier. It might be a bit lonely, but at least no one was glaring at him anymore. So that was a start.

He opened the book and immediately became fascinated with the knowledge that _dragons were real, too_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Submitting Info:  
> Stacked with: Hogwarts (Term 10); MC4A  
> Individual Challenges: Yellow Ribbon (Y); Yellow Ribbon Redux; Gryffindor MC; Hufflepuff MC; Tiny Terror; Sett to Destroy; Cleric MC; Brush; Neurodivergent; Quiet Time (Y); Ethnic & Present; The Real MC; Short Jog  
> House: Hufflepuff  
> Assignment No.: Term 10 – Assignment 9  
> Subject (Task No.): Wandlore (Task #7: Write about someone intimidating.)  
> Representation(s): Autistic Harry Potter; Madam Pomfrey  
> Bonus Challenges: Sneeze Weasel; Machismo; Second Verse (Not a Lamp; White Dress); Chorus (Wabi Sabi)  
> Tertiary Bonus Challenges: T3 (Toad); SN (Rail; Ameliorate)  
> Word Count: 1311

**Author's Note:**

> Submitting Info:  
> Stacked with: Hogwarts (Term 10); MC4A  
> Individual Challenges: Yellow Ribbon (Y); Yellow Ribbon Redux; Gryffindor MC (x3); Slytherin MC; Neurodivergent; Quiet Time (Y); Short Jog (Y); Tiny Terror (Y); Ethnic & Present; Advice from the Mug; Sett to Destroy  
> House: Hufflepuff  
> Assignment No.: Term 10 – Assignment 7  
> Subject (Task No.): Arithmancy (Task #01: Write about two people communicating.)  
> Space Address (Prompt): 1B (Planting/Sowing)  
> Representation(s): Autistic Harry Potter; Hermione Granger; Trio; Child Abuse  
> Bonus Challenges: Found Family; Nontraditional; Bee Haven; Machismo; Peddling Pots; Second Verse (Ladylike; Not a Lamp; Persistence Still; White Dress); Chorus (Endless Wonder; Wabi Sabi)  
> Tertiary Bonus Challenges: T3 (Thimble); SN (Rail; Ameliorate)  
> Word Count: 1014


End file.
